Barker Camp Section of the N. Chickamauga Creek Segment

 

Lora and I headed out to Barker Camp Road to hike the North End of the South Section of the N. Chickamauga Creek Segment of the Cumberland trail. 

Is this section complete?? Well I will describe it the only way I can. We took the blue blazed trail from the parking lot to where it dumps you out on an old roadbed with no further marking. From prior experience I knew that if you went left uphill you would eventually come across the trail heading to Stevenson's Branch. If you go right and downhill you will end up on Cain Creek. From Cain Creek you have to make your way back upstream until you find the Furnace Rock. You will see the bridge from there. There is no trail to the bridge so you have to climb your own way there. At the other end of the bridge you will find a staircase and at the end of it nothing. If you go to the bluff wall and go right climbing over the rocks you will find Vortex Falls. If you go to the bluff wall and go left up the hillside you will eventually find the trail. Now this section of trail is blazed. The trail is partly built being that there are a lot of rocks. Some are stable and there are some good steps. Problem is there are a lot of the rocks which are loose so you don't know which ones you can trust. There is a section that has washed down into the creek and a couple of blow downs.

The trail follows Cain Creek and is blazed up until the confluance of Chickamauga Creek. Here the trail is just flagged. You follow the flagging and the trail will climb up and follow some bluff lines. After the bluff lines the trail will go uphill and follow an old roadbed. Shortly up the roadbed the flagging goes off to the left, but there is no trail here. The trail continues along the roadbed and is not marked in any way. The roadbed goes across the top of the mountain for a while and then drops back of into the Chickamauga Creek Gorge. Here the blazing starts back up for a while before going back to just flagging. We turned back at Holly Branch because of time. It looks like they either had a log bridge here or have one to be placed.

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TTA McGill Creek

 

I got to go to McGill Creek today in some beautiful weather to hike and visit with friends. We started at Downy View lane and hiked to the Roaring Creek trailhead parking area. Five of us total including Don, Joan, Sara, and Jane. Don led the hike and also recorded all the downed trees so he could report them to the CTC. We enjoyed our lunch at the McGill Creek Falls. The first mile or so from Downy View Lane is not built trail, but is flagged to the built trail. 

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Honey Creek TTA

 

The 12 hikers led by Deb started out from the overlook, and down the ladders. A group of 4 left us at the split for a shorter hike. The other 8 set out to do the whole loop. It was cold this morning, 21 at daylight, so I expected to see frozen trail and icicles hanging. Instead we got muddy trail, and waterfalls. And ropes. The water levels in the creek crossings were low enough that we skipped the ledge crawling. We had a couple of hikers slide/slip/fall, nobody fell in the creek. As we crossed the road near the end of the hike, two more hikers said they'd had enough and road walked to the cars. The 6 of us finished the loop. 50 percent, not too bad. Beautiful day to be in the Big South Fork. 

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Hall Road section of North Chickamauga Creek

 After reading on the CTC newsletter from August about some folks hiking this trail, we went hunting for the trailhead (newsletter said Hall Road). We drove Hall Road twice, no trail. Google North Chickamauga Creek, boom, Old Anderson Road. Dirt, rough, but found a parking area and a kiosk (with nothing on it) and a brown Cumberland Trail sign along with a Wild Trails sign. It was cold and we had a little snow falling. Lora had her mask on, not for covid, just for cold. Trail followed North Chick Creek, so pretty, lots of hemlocks, mountain laurel and lots of camping areas. Easy walk. About 5 miles in we turned around at Seed Tick Branch. Found remnants of a still. The sun came out and we had blue sky and a little bit of warm air. 

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McGill Creek

On the way to Walmart we decided to go ahead and hike McGill Creek to the falls and back. Another beautiful day and we got to meet Dana a friend of our blog on the trail. Pretty cool!

 

Panther Creek State Park

 

Lora and I decided to head to Panther Creek State Park to do some hiking. They have a lot of trails here that go all over. Most of them are short but there are a lot of loops. We had stayed one night here before, but it was inroute to the AT and never got to check out the park. We really enjoyed it. We saw lots of deer in the hills. It would be a great place to canoe as well.

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Christmas 2020

This year with the Covid 19 lots of things were different including Christmas. The family get to gethers were different. Our first gathering was at Lora's Dad and Moms' with Mitsi and Paul as well as Nick and Amy on video. We had dinner and opened gifts this way.

Our second gathering was at the cousins' house which was more normal with everyone getting together.

Our third gathering was at Uncle Rick and Aunt Lindas' house with Dad, Mom, and Austin. Once again the family had a zoom meeting later that evening to visit.

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Daddy's Creek - CT

 Lora and I was going to Crossville so we of course added in a hike. We drove to Crab Orchard and hiked part of the Daddy's Creek segment of the CT. The last time we hiked this segment they didn't have an overlook or campground so that was new to us. This is a really pretty section of trail. They have a nice sign and parking lot now too.

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Sequatchie CT

 

Lora and I went to the Head of the Sequatchie to find that Cumberland trail. We followed the Southern loop that went past the campsite before. It was a mess and ended shortly after the campground. This time we did the Northern part of the loop. It is in a lot better shape and has a few nice bridges. It goes a lot further up the mountain as well. It is a shame to see trail sitting like this not being used. Hopefully they will get the rest of it built soon.

McGill Creek Segment

 

Did a little trail maintenance on the McGill Creek Segment today. We hiked in from Downey View Road and went down near the bridge. We were very happy to see the work that they have done from McGill Creek Falls to the bridge. Beautiful section of trail.

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